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Sunday, January 12, 2014

Regression

What a dirty little word.
Brady had a pretty big 'regression' with his speech over Christmas break. I realized it when we traveled to St. Louis and listened to him speak in conversations. He lost a lot of his words when speaking in sentences to others.
I volunteered at the boy's school on Thursday and sat in on Brady's speech therapy. I noticed the therapist kept recording Brady. He actually did 'ok' on some of his individual words he'd been working on, but when asked to say a phrase with the same words, it was awful. It's a hard feeling to describe, but I felt like I was punched in the gut, and felt my face getting red/hot, and I fought back tears.
Example: Brady is working on saying 'Brady', which he can say "BayDee" and he can say 'bear', although it sort of sounds as if he were deaf when he says the word. The therapist had him hold up a bear and say "Brady and the bear" and it came out repeatedly as "GeeGee a a Gare".
Ugh.
I found out after the session that parts like that were recorded so the therapist could show just how big of a regression he had from the break in therapy. I guess to 'prove' his needs for future IEPs.

So, we are now on the hunt for a summer-plan for him. I had previously researched a program in Detroit that is pretty amazing (Kaufman Institute) and it just so happens I have a great friend who lives near this facility for the boys and I to stay with. I'd have to have our therapist record a session and apply for Brady to see if he'd be accepted, but of course, I need a lot of professional opinions before uprooting my kids, paying a small fortune, and hoping it helps Brady if he even were accepted.
So that's where I am. I'm collecting information from everyone to find the best fit for Brady to get him some beefed up help before kindergarten this summer.
Our therapist is speaking with a colleague of hers from Pewaukee who uses the PROMPT technique for severe cases, and she's thinking it may be better for Brady to have extensive almost-daily therapy here at home throughout the entire summer. I'm hoping this option pans out so I can keep Jax home for his therapies this summer too. I'm looking into a few different programs for him to work on hand writing before kinder as well.

Here is a video of Brady from a few days ago. I recorded Jax doing some feeding and Brady motioned to me that he wanted to be recorded. This is what he said:

In other news,
The boys were home most of last week due to extremely cold temps (yes, there is such a thing in Wisconsin to be colder than cold). We did a lot of board-game playing! The boys got the idea in their head that they wanted a very specific Wii game and asked us constantly about it. This has never really happened before. I mean, they've asked us for things before, but they've never ASKED us for things before if that makes any sense. I realized later, that Brady was talking about the video game store above in that video by the way! Here's another example of the WANT, here is Brady's face when I told him NO and that we just had Christmas and we don't just 'get things' when we want them:

Really Buddy? He had an iPad to SHOW me for the 10th time what it was that he wanted. He cried. Actually gave me the big doe-eyes and cried. Then, I found this nice little note from him before he left for school:

Yup, he wrote out 'wii'. Hilarious and scary at the same time knowing the lengths of manipulation a 5 year old has already learned. Then, I had Jax ask me if I was taking Brady to the video game store while he was in feeding therapy. Wow, they're teaming up.
So, guess what happened? The biggest PARENT FAIL on our parts to date. Daddy found it at a used-game store and brought it home. Guess what happened next?
They fought, argued and yelled at each other while we told them to eat dinner. It was awful. Like two unknown little brats were just uncaged and in our kitchen.
Ugh.
So, we're going back to little or no unearned toys between Christmas and birthday! Don't get me wrong, they love this game (Resort Sport? PingPong, Jousting etc, it's hilarious) but their reaction was gross, and we're over it, lol! We've always believed 'stuff' makes kids nuts. And they prove us right.
(sigh)
I have other things to report, I'm sure, but I see this post is way too long already! I'll update soon since Brady has an allergy test tomorrow to see if we can figure out what his triggers are for his seasonal allergies and eczema. Yay :)

3 comments:

Hugs! It is hard to see regression but as an SLP I thought, "There is her regression proof for summer!" My oldest is making little progress on his grasp because he has so much else to perfect before that will come but it kills me. He will be in K next year and he won't be able to write and can't get OT in school since it cannot be a stand alone service so continued out of pocket OT an hour from home once a week will have to do. Sigh....it is hard.

Hi Annie-we obviously haven't met, but I have been following your blog shortly after the boys were pregnant. My son, who is 4 1/2, struggles with speech, fine motor skills and was recently diagnosed with sensory processing disorder. Your challenges hit so close to home and while I would never wish these struggles on anyone, I have to admit that I find a weird sort of peace in knowing that I'm not alone. I have no answers for you, but want to offer you encouragement and support.You are a true inspiration and those boys are so blessed to have you and Jason as their advocates. Hugs to you!

Annie-My 5 year old daughter, Julia, does PROMPT. She had been making no progress with just regular speech therapy at school. She does PROMPT twice a week privately and it has been the best thing for her. You aren't alone in your struggle to get your child to talk and to understand what he says. Please email if you would like to chat SteinSL at gmail dot com. Stephanie